Malakula

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Malakula
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Vanuatu - Malakula.PNG
Map of Malakula
Malakula
Geography
Location Pacific Ocean
Coordinates 16°15′S167°30′E / 16.250°S 167.500°E / -16.250; 167.500
Archipelago New Hebrides
Area2,041 km2 (788 sq mi)
Highest elevation879 m (2884 ft)
Highest point Mount Liambele
Administration
Vanuatu
Province Malampa
Largest settlement Lakatoro
Demographics
Population22,934 (2009)
Ethnic groups Ni-Vanuatu

Malakula Island, also spelled Malekula, is the second-largest island in the nation of Vanuatu, formerly the New Hebrides, in Melanesia, a region of the Pacific Ocean.

Contents

Location

Malakula is separated from the islands of Espiritu Santo and Malo by the Bougainville Strait. Lakatoro, the capital of Malampa Province, is situated on Malakula's northeastern shore and is the largest settlement on the island. Just off the northeastern coast of Malakula, there is a group of islands called the Small Islands, including, in order from north to south: Vao, Atchin, Wala, Rano, Norsup, Uripiv, and Uri. Also off the coast: Tomman Island to the southwest; Akhamb Island to the south; and the Maskelynes Islands to the southeast (including Sakao Island and Uluveo).

Malakula has a maximum elevation of 879 m. Its peak is called Mt. Liambele. [1] In 1768, Louis Antoine de Bougainville gave his name to the straits that separate Malakula from Santo.

History

Effigy Figure (Rambaramp), before 1880. Wood, fiber, mud, pigment, bone, shell, boar's tusks. Brooklyn Museum Effigy Figure (Rambaramp), before 1880.jpg
Effigy Figure (Rambaramp), before 1880. Wood, fiber, mud, pigment, bone, shell, boar's tusks. Brooklyn Museum
Canoe prow, Vao Island MHNT Vanuatu MHNT ETH AC NG 29 pirogue.jpg
Canoe prow, Vao Island MHNT

Malakula was inhabited for centuries by the Ni-Vanuatu people before Europeans encountered it. The first Europeans to sight the island were the members of the Spanish expedition of Pedro Fernández de Quirós, in 1606. [2]

After being visited in 1774 by Captain James Cook, on his second voyage to the Pacific, the islands were colonised in the late 18th century by both the British and the French, eventually becoming a condominion called in English the New Hebrides.

In 1914 and 1915, the British anthropologist John Layard lived on Malakula, doing anthropological fieldwork, taking notes, making phonographic records, and taking more than 400 photographs. When he returned to Britain, he donated copies of his photographs on plates to the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, at Cambridge.

In 2001 the German painter Ingo Kühl, after participating in an expedition of the Cultural Center to ceremonies of the indigenous people on Malakula, his works that were created there were shown in an exhibition at the National Museum of Vanuatu in Port Vila and in 2004–2005 at the Ethnological Museum of Berlin. [3]

Demographics

According to the 2009 census, Malakula has around 23,000 inhabitants. [4]

Nearly thirty different languages are spoken on the island. [5] Unlike some earlier classifications, linguist and Oceanic languages specialist John Lynch (2016) considered the Malakula languages to form a coherent group. [6] The two tribes living on Malakula are the Big Nambas, who live in the northern area of the island, and the Small Nambas, who live in the central part of the southern area. The tribes’ names are a reference to the size of the penis sheaths worn by the men, which are made out of banana or pandanus leaves. [7]

Until recently, it was the custom in the culture of these tribes to bind infants' skulls in order to permanently alter the shape of their heads. Cone-shaped skulls were considered a sign of higher social status.

Economy and services

Malakula funeral masks - nineteenth century Masque des Vanuatu - Saves MHNT ETH AC NH 66.jpg
Malakula funeral masks – nineteenth century

Malakula's economy is largely based on agriculture. The island has extensive copra plantations on the eastern coastal plains around Norsup and Lakatoro. The largest copra-producing plantation in Vanuatu is in Norsup. In 1939, a copra cooperative was set up at Matanvat in northern Malakula. For a while it turned to cargo cult activities, but after 1950 it resumed copra production.

Both Norsup and Lakatoro have telephones and 24-hour electricity. Norsup is the site of the provincial hospital. Lakatoro has more stores than Norsup. It has a market house, a branch of the National Bank of Vanuatu, and an Air Vanuatu office. It is also the site of the island's main wharf and the administrative centre for Malampa province (which includes Malekula, Ambrym and Paama).

Tourism

The interior of Malekula is mountainous, rugged, and forest-covered. It is a good place for walking and bird watching. There are old cannibal sites hidden in the bush in northern Malekula, but at many of them the bones and skulls have been removed or buried. The Maskelynes and the small offshore islands along the east coast of Malekula have sand beaches, as well as coral reefs that are good places for recreational snorkeling and diving.

Transportation

Air transport

There are three airports on Malekula. They are located at Norsup (in the northern part of the island), Lamap (in the southeastern part of the island), and Southwest Bay. The Norsup airport has a tarmac surface. Air Vanuatu operates daily flights to Malekula.

Road transport

Lakatoro is Malekula's road-transport hub. The best place to find trucks is at the Lakatoro Trading Centre. There are several trucks along the northeast coast as far as Vao.

See also

Literature

in Bislama language
John Layard long Malakula 1914–1915, Vanuatu Cultural Centre

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Malampa Province</span> Province of Vanuatu

Malampa is one of the six provinces of Vanuatu, located in the center of the country. It consists of three main islands: Malakula, Ambrym and Paama, and takes its name from the first syllable of their names. It includes a number of other islands – the small islands of Uripiv, Norsup, Rano, Wala, Atchin and Vao off the coast of Malakula, and the volcanic island of Lopevi. Also included are the Maskelynes Islands and some more small islands along the south coast of Malakula.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ambrym</span> Volcanic island in Vanuatu

Ambrym is a volcanic island in Malampa Province in the archipelago of Vanuatu. Volcanic activity on the island includes lava lakes in two craters near the summit.

Lakatoro is the capital of Malampa Province of the island country of Vanuatu. It is situated on the eastern shore of Malakula and is the largest settlement in that island. Lakatoro consists of a couple of retail shops, a supermarket, a local market selling locally farmed goods.

The Central Vanuatu languages form a linkage of Southern Oceanic languages spoken in central Vanuatu.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Southern Oceanic languages</span> Subgroup of the Oceanic branch of the Austronesian language family

The Southern Oceanic languages are a linkage of Oceanic languages spoken in Vanuatu and New Caledonia. It was proposed by John Lynch in 1995 and supported by later studies. It appears to be a linkage rather than a language family with a clearly defined internal nested structure.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Languages of Vanuatu</span> Languages spoken in the South Pacific country Vanuatu

The Republic of Vanuatu has the world's highest linguistic density per capita. Despite being a country with a population of less than 300,000, Vanuatu is home to 138 indigenous Oceanic languages.

John Willoughby Layard was an English anthropologist and psychologist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Namba (clothing)</span> Traditional penis sheath from Vanuatu

A namba is a traditional penis sheath from Vanuatu. Nambas are wrapped around the penis of the wearer, sometimes as their only clothing. Two tribes on Malakula, the Big Nambas and the Smol (Small) Nambas, are named for the size of their nambas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maskelyne Islands</span> Archipelago in Malampa Province, Vanuatu

The Maskelyne Islands, often abbreviated as the Maskelynes, are a small chain of low islands that forms part of Vanuatu in the Pacific Ocean. Among the islands are Awei, Avock, Leumanang, Uluveo, and Vulai. Uluveo is the main island in the group and has three villages.

Norsup is an island across the bay from the village with the same name on Malakula Island in Malampa Province, Vanuatu in the Pacific Ocean.

Vao is an islet off the north-eastern coast of Malakula in Vanuatu in the Pacific Ocean. The 1999 census showed a population of 667, which increased in 2009 to 898.

Tirax is an Oceanic language spoken in north east Malakula, Vanuatu.

Uripiv Island is a small inhabited island in Malampa Province of Vanuatu in the Pacific Ocean. Uripiv lies off the north coast of Malekula Island. The estimated terrain elevation above the sea level is some 8 meters.

Uluveo Island is a small, inhabited island in Malampa Province of Vanuatu in the Pacific Ocean. Uluveo is a part of the Maskelyne Islands archipelago.

Vulaï is a small inhabited island in Malampa Province of Vanuatu in the Pacific Ocean. It is a part of the Maskelyne Islands archipelago. The island is also known as Harper Island.

Awei is a small uninhabited island in Malampa Province of Vanuatu in the Pacific Ocean. It is a part of the Maskelyne Islands archipelago.

Arthur Bernard Deacon (1903-1927) was a social anthropologist who carried out fieldwork on the islands of Malakula and Ambrym in what is now Vanuatu.

The Malakula languages are a group of Central Vanuatu languages spoken on Malakula Island in central Vanuatu. Unlike some earlier classifications, linguist and Oceanic languages specialist John Lynch (2016) considered the Malakula languages to form a coherent group.

Savage Civilisation by Tom Harrisson was published in January 1937 by Victor Gollancz. The book is a mixture of history, ethnographical account and travel narrative, set in the New Hebrides. Harrisson’s biographer, Judith Heimann, describes it as one of the “few works of scholarship in the social sciences to have survived so well the sixty-odd years” since its publication.

References

  1. ↑ Malekula, Vanuatu – island travel, accommodation, culture, reefs, beaches, rivers, forests
  2. ↑ Rienzi, M.L. Historia de la Oceanía, o quinta parte del mundo Barcelona, 1845-1846, vol IV, p.107
  3. ↑ "Südsee-Wellen". www.smb.museum.
  4. ↑ 2009 Census Summary release final Archived 2013-12-21 at the Wayback Machine – Government of Vanuatu
  5. ↑ Languages of Malakula
  6. ↑ Lynch, John (December 2016). "Malakula Internal Subgrouping: Phonological Evidence". Oceanic Linguistics. University of Hawai'i Press. 55 (2): 399–431. doi:10.1353/ol.2016.0019. S2CID   152170547.
  7. ↑ Malakula island of Vanuatu


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